Casual Encounters -CHAP.13-DRRR

   When Ritchie woke up she found she was surprisingly warm and content. She shifted slightly – her neck felt a little stiff… And when she opened her eyes she saw why. Instead of the pillow she usually slept on, she was lying on Izaya instead. That wasn't a good sign. She was never normally so comfortable with him…

   She pulled away and propped herself up on one elbow. Izaya was still asleep and didn't stir in the slightest. She studied his face for a while. A slight frown creased his forehead, making him look irritated even whilst sleeping.

   Ritchie sighed. Damn… When had she gotten in so deep? She wasn't the kind of girl who liked to snuggle. And she wasn't the kind of girl who took pleasure in watching somebody sleep. She was starting to get confused about what she wanted and that was dangerous.

   Though after a minute or so of deliberation she eventually curled back up on Izaya's chest. Where was the fun in taking the safe option?

                                                     *

   By the night-time Ritchie had completely forgotten about her morning confusion. She was out with Sei and some of her friends again so right now she was more interested in drinking, dancing and having a good time.

   So far she hadn't done much drinking or dancing. She'd forgotten how much fun she could have simply being around other party people like herself. Or even just people who weren't sick and twisted like a certain somebody she knew.

   After a while Reita turned up with a group of his friends. Sei disappeared off with him and Arisa and Mena soon followed in an attempt to hit it off with some of Reita's friends. Ritchie was left at the bar with a girl with long honey-coloured hair and glasses, who she was sure hadn't been out with them before.

   "Are you not gonna go on the pull with them?" the girl asked her, seemingly surprised that she wasn't the only one still left at the bar.

   Ritchie shook her head. "Boyfriend," she said casually. "Plus none of the guys here really do it for me."

   "Amen to that," agreed the girl ruefully.

   Ritchie smiled and held out her hand. "I'm Ritchie."

   "Lexi," replied the girl, giving her hand a good shake.

   "I haven't seen you before. You weren't on either of the last bar crawls, were you?" asked Ritchie.

   "Nah, this is the first time I've been out with Sei in a while," said Lexi. "I've been doing too many morning shifts to get away with going out much."

   "Oh, so you don't go to university with her?" That was what Ritchie had actually assumed.

   Lexi shook her head. "We used to work together. How do you guys know each other?"

   "From online," said Ritchie hesitantly. She knew that a lot of people thought meeting up with strangers from over the internet was a bad idea. Hell, Izaya had pretty much proved that theory to be right.

   Lexi didn't seem to think so though. "That's cool! So are you part of the Dollars like Sei?"

   Ritchie nodded. The Dollars were a fairly new gang in Ikebukuro that were completely run online. It had seemed quite an exciting idea, so her and Sei had both joined up straightaway after Ritchie had been sent an anonymous email with the password for the site. So far though not much seemed to have come of it.

   "Me too," said Lexi happily. "Do you go in the chatroom much?"

   "I haven't for ages," replied Ritchie. "I haven't really been around a computer a whole lot lately… And when I do it's not normally my own." Plus it was too reminiscent of her lifestyle back in Nerima.

   Lexi nodded understandingly. "Sei did say you were more of a social bug." She glanced across the dance floor with a bored look on her face. "I'm guessing your boyfriend's more interesting than all the guys here?"

   Ritchie grinned ruefully. She liked that Lexi had used the word interesting rather than 'cool' or 'nice', since neither of them would have really fitted in this case. "I guess you could say that." Her gaze followed Lexi's out onto the dance floor. "So what kinda guys do you go for if none of these are floating your boat?"

   Lexi gave a casual shrug. "Well I don't do guys who are all into their appearance. I guess I like strong men… But not if they overdo it and end up looking like one big hunk of muscle."

   Ritchie made a face. She hated well-built guys. "Me neither – it looks too fake."

   They ordered some more drinks and chatted a while longer. The more they talked the more Ritchie couldn't help but think that she knew of someone who would definitely be Lexi's type… Shizuo.

   But she didn't mention anything. She liked Lexi and she still saw Shizuo as a bit of an unrefined brute. Izaya had clouded her vision more and she instinctively saw Shizuo as the enemy now – even more so than she originally had. She couldn't match make somebody she liked with the enemy. Lexi could do better.

   After a while Ritchie noticed that the two guys Arisa and Mena had been dancing with had branched off on their own. She recognised one of them as Hanabusa – the guy Sei had tried to set her up with. She didn't know the other guy but he kept looking over in her and Lexi's direction.

   "Is that one of Reita's friends over there with Hanabusa?" Ritchie asked Lexi.

   Lexi glanced over towards where Ritchie was looking. "Yeah, his name's Fujio… something. Why, do you know him?"

   It didn't take Ritchie long to make the connection. Sei had told her that Reita's friend who had been hospitalised because of Izaya was called Fuji… Now why did she have a feeling that this was the same person?

   She wondered if he knew who she was. She was sure that Sei would have had the common sense not to say anything to Reita, but Ritchie's relationship with Izaya wasn't exactly a secret. There were quite a few people in the city who knew about it now.

   Either way, she felt uneasy when she noticed Fuji glance in her direction yet again. "No," she told Lexi. "I thought I recognised him but maybe not…" She then downed the rest of her drink in one. "You wanna go dance for a bit?"

   "Yeah, okay," agreed Lexi, her surprised eyes on Ritchie's now empty glass. "Let's go."

   They went to dance with Arisa and Mena, who seemed to have gotten bored of dancing with the guys. Ritchie soon grew antsy for another drink, but Fujio was now standing by the bar and she felt that it would probably be better to avoid him.

   A glass of luminescent liquid had been sitting on an empty table near them for a while now. Ritchie pointed to it and asked her group if it belonged to any of them. The other girls all shook their heads – finder's keepers – so Ritchie shrugged, grabbed the glass and downed it.

   Vodka and some kind of energy drink. Nice.

   She managed to collar Sei not long afterwards to get her next drink for her. Soon after that she didn't care about Fujio anymore. Actually she didn't really care about anything… She just wanted to dance and have fun.

   But dancing then quickly lost its appeal. She could feel the energy pumping through her veins – she needed to do something more exciting. Something more dangerous.

   "We should go do something fun!" Ritchie enthused to Sei the next time she caught hold of her.

   Sei gave her an amused look. "Like what?"

   "You know, something exciting!"

   Sei laughed. "Again… like what?"

   Ritchie sighed. Sei didn't get it. None of the girls here would. There was only one person she knew who'd really understand her definition of exciting…

   "I think I'm gonna head off," she decided abruptly.

   Sei raised her eyebrows. "Are you now? Why do I have a feeling I know who you're going to find?"

   "Because you know me too well?" Ritchie grinned.

   Sei laughed again. "You really are a head case… Well I hope you have fun!" She was assured by her friend's ability to still speak coherently that she'd be safe to leave on her own.

   "You too. Hey, can you give Lexi my number?" requested Ritchie. She hadn't seen the new girl for the last ten minutes. "She seems cool – we should hang out again."

   "Sure thing," agreed Sei, giving Ritchie a quick hug. "I'll text you tomorrow."

   Ritchie started off power walking to Izaya's place, fuelled by the sugar from the energy drink. After a while the alcohol seemed to hit her a little harder and she slowed her pace as she started to sway more. No big deal. This wasn't exactly an unusual occurrence for her.

   When she got up to Izaya's apartment she banged on the door, then leant against the wall to wait. He took a while to answer and when he did he looked like he'd just woken up – his hair was tousled and he wasn't wearing a shirt. He seemed surprised to see her. "Ritchie-chan? I didn't expect you to be back so early."

   In response Ritchie threw herself at him, almost knocking him over as she grabbed his face and fastened her lips over his. Izaya staggered backwards a few steps, before managing to peel her away and hold her at arm's length.

   "What are you doing? Are you drunk again?" he asked exasperatedly, still a little taken aback by her surprise attack.

   "Hey, you were the one who wanted us to be a couple," Ritchie protested half-heartedly, pulling away from him.

   Izaya sighed. "You are drunk."

   Ritchie ignored him and grabbed hold of his arm. "Don't you wanna go and find something interesting to do?"

   "Not right now, Ritchie-chan," Izaya declined. "Unlike a certain party animal, some of us were actually sleeping."

   "Come on, don't be boring!" Ritchie whined, tugging at his arm.

   "Not now," Izaya repeated irritably, trying to pull away from her.

   Though Ritchie was generally quite physical in their relationship, she wasn't normally so clingy. Even when she was drunk – she could be tedious, but not this bad. Yet right now she was clinging to him like a limpet, attempting to bring his face back down to hers again.

   "You don't wanna have fun?" Ritchie breathed against his lips.

   Izaya frowned. She didn't taste like alcohol the way she normally did when she was drunk. He'd tasted it on her enough times before to know… He pushed her back, holding her at arm's length again so that he could study her face.

   "Your eyes are huge. Have you taken something?" he asked suspiciously.

   "No I haven't!" Ritchie replied indignantly. She may have had no resistance where alcohol was concerned, but she'd never been into the drug scene. And she was sober enough to remember that.

   "So why are you acting so weird if you're not drunk?" asked Izaya, still watching her eyes. She seemed to be aware of what was going on but she didn't look very focused. Her pupils were dilated and glazed over. Something wasn't right…

   "I'm not acting weird. I just wanna have fun with you…" said Ritchie huskily, reaching for him again.

   "Just stop a second!" snapped Izaya, seizing her by the wrist. "Something's not right with you."

   "Let go of me," protested Ritchie, trying to prise his fingers away.

   "Maybe you had your drink spiked or something," said Izaya, still scrutinising her face.

   "Let go!" repeated Ritchie more forcibly.

   Izaya ignored her protests, though he still kept a tight grip on her wrist. "You'll probably be fine by tomorrow. It doesn't look like it's doing you much harm."

   Ritchie clearly wasn't listening to him either. "Let go! Let go!" she cried, becoming more frantic. She'd given up on prising his fingers off and was now making a futile attempt to pull away from him.

   "What the hell's wrong with you? Just calm down," Izaya ordered irritably. Why was she freaking out like that? It wasn't like her at all. He squeezed her wrist hard to make sure he had her attention.

   What he didn't expect was for Ritchie to cry out in pain. Normally she would never have given him that satisfaction. "Stop it! Just let me go!" she pleaded.

   Izaya stared at her. Her eyes were almost wild and they were starting to gloss over, almost as if she was about to cry. There was definitely something wrong.

   He closed his eyes in disdain and pinched the bridge of his nose with his free hand. He couldn't be bothered to deal with this. What he really wanted was to throw her outside so that he wouldn't have to. But she'd probably get herself hit by a car in this state… And then he'd have to go through the trouble of finding a new toy to play with.

   "I'm calling Shinra," Izaya decided finally. "You can wait in here."

   He dragged Ritchie upstairs to the bedroom, ignoring her protests and attempts to pull away. He shoved her rather unceremoniously into the room and then shut the door on her. She carried on shouting incoherently but she didn't try to get out.

   Izaya hoped Shinra would know what to do – he wouldn't be able to put up with this for long. He stopped to pull on a shirt that he'd left in the bathroom, then went back downstairs to call Shinra. Despite it being late he still answered on the fourth ring.

   "Izaya? What are you doing calling at this time?"

   "Fancy making a house call?" asked Izaya casually.

   "What's wrong? Are you ill?" questioned Shinra.

   "It's not me. I've got a crazy woman in my apartment – I think she's had her drink spiked," replied Izaya.

   "Wait, hang on… Who's in your apartment?" asked Shinra, clearly confused.

   Izaya sighed. "Look, can you come or not? I really don't want the hassle of having to call an ambulance."

   "Yeah, okay, I'll get Celty to bring me straightaway," promised Shinra, switching to his professional mode, even though he clearly had no clue what was going on. You had to hand it to him. "We'll be there in ten."

   True to his word, Shinra turned up soon afterwards with Celty in tow. Ritchie had quietened down since, but she hadn't left the safety of Izaya's room and he definitely hadn't bothered to disturb her.

   "She's up there," said Izaya, jerking his thumb towards the stairs.

   Celty keyed in a quick message on her handheld communicator and held it up for Izaya to see. 'Is this Ritchie?'

   Izaya nodded, whilst Shinra peeped over Celty's shoulder to read what she'd put. "Ritchie? Isn't she the girl who works at that Ouhei club? What's she doing here?"

   Celty answered for Izaya by typing out another message. 'She's his girlfriend.'

   "Hold up, you have a girlfriend?" Shinra exclaimed in amazement.

   Izaya rolled his eyes. "Yes. Are you going to treat her or not?" he asked bluntly.

   "Aww Izaya, are you concerned about her?" Shinra teased, putting on an exaggerated baby voice. "Do you lurve her?"

   Izaya sighed. Shinra was a fool for thinking that mocking him would actually work. "I'm more concerned about her freaking out again and destroying my apartment."

   Shinra pouted at him, obviously having hoped for a different answer. "You're so inhuman sometimes, Izaya."

   "Exactly."

   The underground doctor eventually reverted back to his professional manner and told Izaya to lead the way. Once upstairs they found Ritchie sitting quietly on the end of the bed, staring at the floor in front of her. Her earlier paranoia seemed to have completely disappeared.

   Shinra pulled a small flashlight pen out of his bag so that he could check Ritchie's eyes. She remained silent and allowed him to check without disruption. Izaya found her passiveness to be even more unnerving than when she'd been freaking out.

   "She's definitely taken some kind of drug, whether it was voluntary or not," Shinra diagnosed. "Her pupils are really dilated, see?"

   "I noticed," replied Izaya uninterestedly.

   "She seems quite calm now…" continued Shinra, now checking Ritchie's pulse rate. "The worst is probably over, but I'd still keep an eye on her just to be sure. She'll likely feel the after-effects tomorrow."

   "I'm not a babysitter," said Izaya irritably.

   Before Shinra could reply Celty had already typed out a message and held up her communicator, 'Then we'll take her back with us and we'll look after her.'

   Shinra laughed. "I think Celty thinks you're being a bit insensitive…" He looked a little awkward. "But we can take her with us if you don't want to keep an eye on her."

   Izaya gritted his teeth. He could feel a headache building between his temples – all he wanted right now was to just go back to sleep. But he did want to make sure that Ritchie knew never to come to him if she got into this state again. He wasn't her keeper and he was not going to watch over her a second time.

   "No, I'll do it," he said stiffly, surprising them both. "Do I have to give her any medication or anything?"

   "Maybe just half a sleeping pill," said Shinra, still a little taken aback by Izaya's decision. "We don't want her to have too many different medications in her system. Half should be enough to help her sleep off most of the effects."

   "Right," said Izaya in a bored tone. At least he could just induce her to sleep.

   "So I guess we'll be off," said Shinra, picking up his bag. "We'll let ourselves out; you just take care of her. Call me if you need anything."

   Celty held up her communicator again. 'And don't be an asshole to her.'

   Izaya just waved his hand at her in dismissal. "Whatever."

   He strongly suspected that Celty would have punched him for his blasé attitude, but Shinra was already hastily directing her towards the stairs. The doctor really could predict her so well… Izaya rolled his eyes at their retreating backs. Where was the fun in that?

   He heard the front door shut behind them moments later, so he went and fetched a glass of water and a sleeping pill from the cabinet in the bathroom. He didn't have the patience to break the tiny tablet into two – he doubted that an extra half would make much of a difference. Either way he was beyond caring.

   When he returned to the bedroom Ritchie hadn't moved from the foot of the bed and was still staring blankly ahead of her. After dissolving the sleeping pill in the water he held the glass out to her.

   "Drink this," he said bluntly. When she didn't respond or even notice the glass in front of her face he raised his voice a little more. "Are you listening? I said drink, Ritchie."

   The added volume seemed to do the trick. Ritchie blinked a couple of times, almost as if she was waking up, before obediently taking the glass from Izaya's hand and starting to drink. After drinking half of the contents she stopped and mumbled something unintelligible.

   Izaya didn't understand or care what she'd said. "Just drink it," he repeated exasperatedly.

   Ritchie did as he said without any complaints and eventually finished off the drug-laced water. Izaya sighed gratefully – now he could finally go back to bed. He took the empty glass from her and left it back on the sink in the bathroom, after urging Ritchie to lie down and go to sleep.

   When he returned to the bedroom once more she was under the covers and already asleep. Thank god... The sleeping pill was clearly working.

   Izaya climbed into the other side of the bed without even bothering to undress and purposely turned so that he was facing away from his problematic girlfriend. He was going to have to think about revoking his offer for her to come round whenever she pleased.